


and one day i'll steal you

by oneworldaway



Category: Warehouse 13
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-17
Updated: 2013-09-17
Packaged: 2017-12-26 21:40:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/970579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oneworldaway/pseuds/oneworldaway
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After all those months, and working up the nerve to make that phone call, it was all rather anticlimactic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	and one day i'll steal you

**Author's Note:**

> Title taken from the song "Johanna" from _Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street_.

The ping was in Univille - which had happened before, but not in some time, and never quite like this. People were dying. Three so far, under very unusual circumstances, and the medical examiner (in the nearest town that _had_ one) was stumped. It was the deadliest artifact to surface in Univille yet, and it posed a greater problem to the Warehouse agents than most.

“Everyone in Univille thinks we’re IRS,” said Pete, “and IRS agents can’t exactly go poking around the ME’s office asking questions about autopsies.”

“But the ME’s not in Univille,” Claudia pointed out. “They wouldn’t know us.”

“No, but the cops handling this case do,” said Myka, “and word travels fast around here. Anyone at the ME’s office mentions that Secret Service Agents Bering and Lattimer stopped by, and we’re doubly screwed.”

“Fake names?” Pete suggested. “Fake badges?”

“I know a guy,” Claudia offered. Artie gave her a Look. “A guy who makes some really awesome pancakes you guys should totally check out once you’ve dealt with this important and 100% licit Warehouse business!”

“Pancakes?” asked Pete, grinning hopefully.

“Artifact,” said Artie, shoving a case file into Pete’s hands.

Pete sighed. “Okay, so how do we do this?”

“I know how,” said Myka, the others all turning to look at her.

~

Helena’s flight got in just after 2am. No one had bothered to argue when Myka had offered to pick her up.

In the car, they discussed the case, and how Helena, as a forensic scientist, would have a much easier time getting a look at the bodies than any of the others would. They went over her cover as an expert flown in to look at the case, and then they chatted about their work, and how they’d been doing, and what they’d been up to.

Myka didn’t ask how Helena had gotten away so quickly. She didn’t ask what she’d told Nate and Adelaide, or why she hadn’t even waited until the next morning to fly out there. She didn’t ask what had happened to Helena’s initial hesitance to assist on another Warehouse mission, the hesitance she’d heard in her voice when she’d first called earlier that day.

To be fair, Myka didn’t bring up how she’d battled cancer since they last met, either. 

She figured there were better times and places for these topics than the highway in the middle of the night.

~

Pete and Myka had been tasked with questioning the locals without revealing that they were actually investigating. Not overly difficult, given the way people talked in small towns like this, but not made particularly easier by their existing cover or the town’s resulting opinions of them. And Myka was restless - she’d had just one cup of coffee too many trying to hide how tired she was from the night before, between getting in so late and scarcely being able to sleep afterward. The weight of everything left unsaid lay heavily on her mind. Lying awake, Myka had thought of the nights Pete had spent at her bedside in the hospital, how he’d been there for her without judgement, even that one night when the pain had taken over and she’d finally, uncharacteristically, broken down. She wondered if he’d show her the same support if she woke him up and told him it felt like her insides were being churned up because the words she wanted to say more than anything kept getting stuck somewhere between her subconscious and her throat. And she wondered if her increasing inability to keep them buried in the back of her mind was what going insane felt like. Was this how Helena had felt when she’d given in to the darkness within her? Had her anger not come from a place of deep, pure love, itself?

When Pete noticed the rhythm her fingers were rapidly tapping out on the counter at the diner where they’d stopped for lunch, Myka hastened to stop, chewing on her lower lip. In the daylight, she understood again why she’d kept silent for so long.

~

“All of the victims appear to have had their throats slit,” Myka reiterated, “only they weren’t. The witnesses to all of their deaths said it was as if their wounds appeared out of nowhere. They bled out within minutes.”

“Right,” said Helena on the other end of the Farnsworth. “But here’s what’s interesting.”

“The whole phantom slasher thing wasn’t interesting enough?” Pete interrupted. “Ooh, the Phantom Slasher. That’d make a great comic book villain.”

“The lacerations,” Helena continued, undeterred, “are consistent with their throats being slit with a blade of the same size and shape as the sort a barber would use for a shave.”

“So our victims were killed by an invisible Sweeney Todd?” asked Claudia.

“Not exactly,” said Helena, “but I suspect you’re on the right track.”

Artie grunted in realization and made for the archives. “There was a blade,” he said, rummaging through files, “that went missing on its way over from Warehouse 12. It was bagged in--”

“1896,” finished Helena. “It was a fellow agent’s retrieval, but we’d all heard the stories.”

“But Sweeney Todd was a fictional character,” said Myka. “It’s only a myth that he was based on a historical figure.”

“That’s what we _wanted_ you to think,” said Artie, in that way he had, as he produced the file he’d been looking for and opened it up on his desk. “In the early 1800s, there was a man who committed a number of crimes in and around London, who would often pose as a barber and slit the throats of his customers. He moved frequently enough that he wasn’t caught until he’d killed at least twelve people. Then, in the 1860s, reports surfaced of another barber’s customers dying in the same manner, only they all left his shop alive, and began bleeding suddenly hours or even days later.”

“But the culprit disappeared,” said Helena, “and the Warehouse didn’t get another lead until 1896, when one of my colleagues retrieved it.”

“So there really was a dude running around putting people into meat pies?” asked Pete, grimacing.

“No, of course not. That’s just an urban legend,” said Artie. (Myka looked exasperated.) “But he was a serial killer, and his blade is an artifact.”

“It was discovered during the retrieval,” Helena went on, “that the blade could be used to kill without ever actually making contact with its victims. Whoever wields the blade can use it on anyone they please, without even touching them. It’s a highly dangerous artifact.” Myka could feel Helena’s eyes fix onto her even as she stood over Pete’s shoulder while he held the Farnsworth. “Be careful,” she said, and there was something different about her voice now that Myka couldn’t dare dwell on.

“We will,” she promised.

~

To protect her cover, Helena was staying at a hotel out of town, so all of their communication was by Farnsworth. (Apparently she’d had her own since she’d gone on the run with the astrolabe. Myka couldn’t help but think of it as just one more way Helena _hadn’t_ chosen to keep in touch with her.) After all those months, and working up the nerve to make that phone call, it was all rather anticlimactic. 

The next day was spent searching Univille for the blade, while Helena stayed put in case they needed anything more from the ME’s office. Their first stop was the barbershop, where Pete, under the guise of sitting down for a shave, discreetly bagged the blade he found waiting on the counter when the barber turned his back, only to find it had no effect. He managed to search the whole shop before he left, but there was no sign of the artifact. But he did find out that Al - the owner of the shop, and the other barber - had taken the day off to “fix some things at home.” So Pete and Myka checked Al’s house next, only to find that he seemed to have left in a hurry. “I think we know who’s got our artifact,” said Pete.

There wasn’t much left for Helena to do, now that they knew who and what they were looking for. Back at the Warehouse at the end of the day, Artie called her up to thank her for her assistance.

“I suppose I’ll look for a flight back to Wisconsin, then,” said Helena. “But that can wait till morning, of course.”

Myka wanted to reach through the Farnsworth and grab her by the shoulders. Why “of course”? How come _this_ flight could wait? Why didn’t she want to get back to her life there as quickly as she’d flown to South Dakota?

Instead she just waved goodbye as Artie ended the call.

~

Myka found that she did some of her best thinking while roaming the Warehouse on her own. It was nearly 10 when she emerged from the stacks, but Claudia was still in the Warehouse, too, typing away at her computer. (Myka suspected this was how Claudia liked to think.)

“Heading back soon, Claud?”

“In a bit.” She didn’t look up from her work, so Myka made her way to the door. But Claudia paused. “So that’s it? She’s really going back tomorrow?”

“What? Oh, yeah,” said Myka, “I guess so.”

“Huh,” said Claudia, staring at the floor now. She laughed softly. “Wow. She didn’t even make it into Univille. Well, probably for the best. Wouldn’t want our cover blown or anything.”

Myka walked over to Claudia. “You wanted to see her,” she said quietly, beginning to understand.

Claudia looked up at Myka. “When she called you guys about that artifact in Wisconsin, I never even got to talk to her. She disappeared on all of us. I’m not gonna lie, that sucked.”

Myka sat down across from Claudia. “It did suck,” she said. “I know you’ve always liked her a lot. I guess we’ve all missed her.” She looked away. “Some more than others.”

“Oh, uh,” said Claudia, her eyes widening, “you don’t have to worry about me.”

“What?”

“Because trust me, I understand the difference between a schoolgirl crush and the real deal, especially when you’ve only just met someone, but that was _ages_ ago, and I swear it was only one dream--”

“Whoa, Claudia,” said Myka, cutting her off, “I was talking about _me_.”

“... _Oh_ ,” said Claudia. “Oh.”

“A dream, huh?”

“So back to you missing H.G. more than the rest of us,” said Claudia, as Myka finished chuckling.

Myka sort of shook her head at herself. “I don’t even know why I’m talking about this now. I don’t know what’s changed.”

“Everything,” said Claudia. “Myka, you were sick. And H.G.’s been in and out of our lives almost too many times to keep count. Everything’s always changing. Maybe this case was just the push you needed.”

“Has anyone ever told you you’re kinda smart?” said Myka, and Claudia grinned.

“It’s come up a few times.”

Claudia waited until Myka was ready to continue. “I told her to stay there,” she recounted. “With Nate. And Adelaide. _I_ told her that. And she’d already made her decision anyway, so what’s left to say?”

“What about telling her how you feel?” asked Claudia.

Myka searched for the right words. “I don’t want to complicate things for her,” she said finally. “She’s got someone to be a mother to there. She’s got...a family. And I couldn’t live with myself if I messed up her chance at happiness.”

“Myka, do you really think she’s happy living the suburban life, in a normal house with a normal job? This is H.G. Wells we’re talking about, here.”

“That’s what I said,” Myka answered sadly, “but she said she _wanted_ a normal life.”

“And you believed her?” Myka shrugged. “Okay, look, H.G. is a lot like both of us. She invents things, like I do, and here’s the thing about an inventor’s mind. We don’t just _stop_ doing new things. We’re like, hardwired to seek new challenges and stuff, and I _know_ she’s not being challenged in Boone, Wisconsin. Plus she’s into books, like you, and what do you? You read about great adventures, and then you go out there and you have them yourself. Adventure’s in her blood. Myka, a person like her doesn’t just give up endless wonder.”

“But she already did,” said Myka. “And I gave her my blessing.”

“So take it back,” said Claudia simply. “Look, you never told her how you felt, right? So she wasn’t making a fully informed decision.” Claudia smiled. “Tell her. And if she still decides to stay there, living a lie, then that’ll be her decision to live with. But if she just needs a little push, you owe it to yourself to take that chance. And you both deserve to be happy.”

Myka took a moment to let all she’d said sink in. “Thanks, Claud.” She stood up and made to leave the office, but stopped again at the door. “You know, I’ve never talked about this with anyone before. I guess I didn’t think it’d...go over this well.”

“Despite our earlier misunderstanding about the whole dream thing,” said Claudia, a bit sheepishly, “I’ve actually had my suspicions about the two of you. And I don’t think I’m the only one. Look, whatever happens, I’m happy to talk about it. But talk to Pete, too. I think he might surprise you.” Claudia turned back to the computer. “And Myka?” she said as Myka began to punch in her security code. “Give H.G. my love.”

“I will.”

~

It was nearly midnight by the time Myka slipped out of the B&B and into her car. She’d taken some time to steel herself for what might lay ahead. But somehow, she wasn’t worried that she’d wake Helena.

Sure enough, when Helena opened the hotel room door, she was still dressed in her clothes for the day, wide awake.

“Myka?”

“Can I come in?” Helena wordlessly moved aside and shut the door behind Myka. “There’s something that I need to say, and it can’t wait until you’ve gone back to Wisconsin and another year has passed.” She took a deep breath. “I’m sorry.”

Helena furrowed her brow. “For what?”

“For being a hypocrite,” said Myka. “I said that you were living a lie, but I wasn’t being completely honest, either, with you or myself. Because if I’d been completely honest, I never would’ve told you to make your home there. If I’d been completely honest, I’d have told you that belong at the Warehouse...with me.”

She let her words hang in the air for a moment before she continued.

“I still believe that the Warehouse is your home. You were born to go on amazing adventures, Helena. But honestly, I just want you here. I _miss_ you. And I feel like I’ve been missing you for years now. Every time you’ve been here, you’ve disappeared again, and I can’t keep saying goodbye to you. The truth is, I want you to make your home with me.”

The only thing louder than the silence was Myka’s own heartbeat in her ears, until Helena’s soft words drowned it all out.

“I left Nate’s house two weeks ago.”

~

Helena stilled when she caught sight of Myka’s scar.

And so, Myka spoke the word that had changed her whole life the year before - a word which, she made it clear, no longer held any power over her. A word that she would not allow to slow her down ever again.

She could only ask that Helena not allow it to slow her down, either. That they talk about it later - after.

So Helena accepted her assurance, and obliged.

~

Pete and Myka bagged the artifact the next day. They found Al a short way out of town, trying to bury the blade in the woods off the highway. He’d found it in his shop and begun using it a few weeks previously, knowing nothing of its power. He hadn’t wanted to kill anyone, but the blade had acted on his feelings of anger toward its victims on its own. They reassured him that it wasn’t his fault and watched him drive away before they bagged it, their cover remaining intact.

Univille mourned its dead, and Pete and Myka attended the funerals. They bowed their heads as they offered silent apologies in the place of any real explanation for those left behind. 

The blade was returned to the Warehouse and shelved where it belonged. Myka finished her paperwork while Pete complained about his. Helena checked out of her hotel.

Claudia was the first to greet her when she walked into the B&B, rolling her suitcase along behind her. Myka felt her heart swell as she watched them embrace. But she hung back by the stairs for now, giving Claudia the chance to say hello. She’d had plenty of time for that already.


End file.
